1906.] BIRDS ABOUT OUR FARM HOMES. 183 



The President. We are to have a stereopticon address this 

 evening, the subject of which is " How shall we attract useful 

 birds about our farm homes." Dr. Edward Howe Forbush, 

 of \\'areham, Mass., is the gentleman who will give the address, 

 and he is now on the platform. I take great pleasure in intro- 

 ducing him to you. 



HOW SHALL WE ATTRACT USEFUL BIRDS ABOUT 



OUR FARM HOMES. 



By Edward Howe Forbush, Wareham, Mass. 



Horace Greeley once said that the farmer who allows a 

 man to shoot his birds would be just as consistent were he to 

 allow him to shoot his cattle, for one is of as much value as 

 the other. While this may be an extreme statement, it is prob- 

 able that were all the birds destroyed the consequences would 

 be quite as serious to the farmer as would be the destruction of 

 all his cattle. Few people realize the value of the services that 

 birds render to man in checking the multiplication of insect life. 



When we fully appreciate the number, the fecundity, and 

 the consuming powers of insects they assume an economic 

 importance greater than can be accorded to the ravening beast 

 of prey. Let us consider briefly the potency for evil that lies 

 hidden in the tiny but innumerable eggs of injurious insects 

 which require only the summer sun to give them destructive life. 



The number of insect species is greater by far than that of 

 all other living creatures combined. ( More than three hundred 

 thousand already have been described.) There are many 

 thousands of undescribed species in museums. Dr. Lintner, 

 the late distinguished State Entomologist of New York, con- 

 sidered it not improbable that a million species of insects would 

 be found in existence. The number of individual insects is be- 

 yond human computation. Dr. Lintner says that he saw at a 

 glance, in a small extent of roadway near Albany, more indivi- 

 duals of a single species of snow-flea, as computed by him, than 

 there are human beings on the face of the earth. A small 

 cherry tree, ten feet in height, was found by Dr. Fitch to be in- 

 fested with an aphis or plant-louse. He estimated, first count- 

 ing the number of these insects on a leaf, the number of leaves 



